Universal Gravitation

Back in black!

2013-05-16T13:13:00.000-05:00

We're back! Back in black! Back in black baby! Ok I think that's enough. By the way, what does back in black even mean? If you ponder it hard enough you realize it makes absolutely zero sense. Thanks AC/DC for popularizing this meaningless term. Speaking of, here's an enjoyable AC/DC tune to keep you company (and no, it's not 'Back in black' - that would be way too obvious):

Moving on. A little update on what's been going on lately. I finished second year of med school literally yesterday. And now I can operate on your brain and remove complicated pancreatic tumors. No, clearly not. But I can tell you 10 random facts about 'Chronic granulomatous disease' or 'Paroxysmal nocturnal hemoglobinuria' - two insanely rare conditions. So I guess that's an achievement of sorts.

In less than 4 weeks, most of us will be taking an eight hour long test, the USMLE Step 1. Your score on this test ~~marks the price of your soul~~ is a crucial factor in ultimately deciding where you go for what specialty. Competitive fields like neurosurgery or dermatology traditionally require higher scores than others.

Most of my classmates will then go on to the hospital to do clinical rotations, while I will head over to the greener pastures of basic science research, spending time amongst pipets, gels and ELISAs. Interesting times lie ahead.

College basketball is boring and other random stuff

2013-03-29T21:28:00.000-05:00

I am coughing a lung out over here in sunny Southern California, but I must soldier to feed the insatiable urge of my dear readers. The show must go on, as they say (btw who the hell comprises this murky "they"? Why don't they ever reveal "them"selves?)

For the first time ever, I deigned to fill out a bracket for march madness. Why, I don't know. Just wanted to get a taste of, I guess. Quite frankly, I am completely baffled by all the attention and hype. Let's be real here people: college basketball sucks. The level of play is obnoxiously abysmal, and the games are so boring and slow, even espresso shots can't keep me up. These teams get a 35 freaking second shot-clock and two 20 minute halves and yet games end with shitty scorelines like 64-60. What the hell are these people doing? It's an insult to the viewer. I would rather watch a far more superior product, the NBA. Meanwhile, feel free to clog up my facebook newsfeed with your inane complaints about bad coaches, bad referees and your desperate analysis of a sub-par sport.

Just finished a block of exams. One more block to go. Infectious diseases was the biggest class of this block, and definitely had the most amount of stuff to learn/memorize. Which makes sense I guess, considering the myriad bacteria and viruses and badass worms have it in for you. And oh man, the cats. So many diseases transmitted through cats. Moral of the class: stay the hell away from cats. They are cute little furry monsters of death. Speaking of which, here's a picture of a cute kitten:

Patiently plotting world domination

That's it for now. Have a Happy Easter.

Ascaris: the subtle, understated badass

2013-03-17T18:54:00.000-05:00

Nature is full of badasses. They come in all sizes and shapes and flavors. Some are big, obvious and downright terrifying: your leopards, cheetahs and other their ilk. Some are ruthless, relentless and overwhelm by the numbers. Army ants fall into this category. Never cross the path of an army ant. Some prefer to take the subtle approach. They display their badassery not by devouring you whole or laying eggs in your dead bodies or ripping you systematically apart. Nope. They believe in the power of invisibility.

The badass on display is from this camp.
It looks like this:

Ascaris: all-around badass

It goes by the name Ascaris lumbricoides. Or roundworm (although technically there are others that compete for this generic name also). Yawn. So prosaic, right?

So prosaic in fact that it infects an estimated billion people worldwide (two, if you believe some of the more optimistic assessments). One Billion. A seventh of humanity.

This mighty parasite lays eggs (and we're talking tiny microscopic eggs) and these eggs chill around in the water mostly. They can be in the soil and food products also. Unsuspecting human ingests these eggs (say, by drinking that water) and boom, it's in. Now these eggs are some of the hardiest and most durable things in biology. Dessication, chemicals, iodine - none of that usual abrasive stuff works on them. After ingestion, eggs hatch in the small intestine and cute little ascaris worms come out.

Next destination: the lungs! These larva travel all the way to the lung (a pretty impressive feat because the digestive track is not directly connected to the pulmonary system. The worm has to travel in the blood). From here, the poor unsuspecting human coughs them out.

Now the devious bastard comes up through cough and gets swallowed. And it ends up in the small intestine. Yet again. Satisfied with this sorcery, it finally matures to its adult worm. Now it puts down down payment for a nice house, buys a nice car, and settles down in your cozy gut.

These things can grow up to 30 cm long. Push away your computers for a second and dwell on that impressive display of badassery. This thing lives in your gut, in all its brazenness, eats the same stuff you eat, and grows amazingly big right inside of you.

Most infections are fairly asymptomatic, but sometimes it throws a tantrum and causes serious complications like bowel obstruction. Surgery is needed in extreme cases. Here's a nice video of valiant surgeons pulling out a handful of worms (they look like spaghetti!) from some unfortunate person's belly:

So next time you are visiting your local shrine of badasses, don't forget to lobby to include this intrepid havoc wrecker in that shrine.

Randomness of music on the car radio

2013-03-16T11:16:00.000-05:00

Listening to music on the car radio carries hazards as well as rewards. Hazards first: you get stuck listening to absolutely terrible commercials or (heaven forbid) pitbull. Since radio stations (Top 40 especially) tend to play the same 40 songs over and over again, the songs start sounding really old and chewed up after a while. Some, of course, deny this and embrace the repetition. It all depends on whether you think Gotye's "Somebody I used to know" is an overplayed piece of shit or a soulful ballad of lost love.

On the rewards side, it's always a pleasant surprise when a song that fell off the radio landscape resurfaces after several months.

That's where Selena Gomez comes in. In the early months of 2012, "Love you like a love song" was all the rage. You couldn't turn on the radio or walk into a coffee shop without catching wisps of that song. It's your standard mass manufactured pop song: catchy beat, healthy dollop of auto-tune, moderately good voice and an overdone topic. I didn't mind it too much. Pleasant enough song. Then it fell off, like these songs do, to be replaced by the Carly Rae Jepsen juggernaut "Call me maybe" and a respectable onslaught by Gotye as well.

So when it popped back again on the radio last week as I was driving to school, a slight smile crept up on my face. I guess I missed you like a love song. Well here is the link to the youtube version:

Coffee: the drink of the gods

2013-03-12T22:28:00.003-05:00

The days are getting longer. The wind is getting nastier, sometimes enough to blow you off the bicycle or knock you off your feet. Most of the snow has melted but you always dread opening weather.com because, well, maybe the next storm is peeping around the corner.

There are drugs to be memorized, an absurdly long laundry list of infections to commit to memory. And don't forget the zebras - your pheochromocytomas, your metachromatic leukodystrophies. Pesky undergrad neighbors are holding ragers well into the wee hours of Saturday. Don't these brats have anything better to do on a Friday night?

Who do you turn to in this time of troubles? (which, by the way, is also the name given to an awesome period in Russian history. Do check it out here if you are into that sort of thing)

Coffee. That smooth, bold liquid gold. Each drop infused with pure awesomeness. Ever sat back and just hear coffee brewing? The coffeemaker gurgles so deliciously. With each drop of fresh coffee made, it makes a deeply satisfying rich chortle. Decaffeinated coffee is an affront to human existence, a sin beyond human comprehension. But you, you know the value of the pure stuff. No creamer, no sugar. Why would you want to insult coffee? When it's all done, you take out the filter. You glance almost wistfully at the uniform mound of used coffee as you throw the filter in the trash. Can I collect it in a jar and store it? With each sip, each heavenly sip, each trouble melts away. The room smells of coffee. It smells of victory.

So here is an ode to you, coffee, the drink of the gods.

Poem of the week - "Snake" by D.H. Lawrence

2013-02-24T10:50:00.002-06:00

D.H. Lawrence might be better known for scandalizing the western world by penning a couple novels in the twenties that defied the cultural mores of the day - "Women in Love" and "Sons and Lovers". But the following poem shows he is a damn fine poet too.

Here's Lawrence with the "Snake":

A snake came to my water-trough

On a hot, hot day, and I in pyjamas for the heat,

To drink there.

In the deep, strange-scented shade of the great dark carob tree

I came down the steps with my pitcher

And must wait, must stand and wait, for there he was at the trough before me.

He reached down from a fissure in the earth-wall in the gloom

And trailed his yellow-brown slackness soft-bellied down, over the edge of the stone trough

And rested his throat upon the stone bottom,

And where the water had dripped from the tap, in a small clearness,

He sipped with his straight mouth,

Softly drank through his straight gums, into his slack long body,

Silently.

Someone was before me at my water-trough,

And I, like a second-comer, waiting.

He lifted his head from his drinking, as cattle do,

And looked at me vaguely, as drinking cattle do,

And flickered his two-forked tongue from his lips, and mused a moment,

And stooped and drank a little more,

Being earth-brown, earth-golden from the burning bowels of the earth

On the day of Sicilian July, with Etna smoking.

The voice of my education said to me

He must be killed,

For in Sicily the black, black snakes are innocent, the gold are venomous.

And voices in me said, if you were a man

You would take a stick and break him now, and finish him off.

But must I confess how I liked him,

How glad I was he had come like a guest in quiet, to drink at my water-trough

And depart peaceful, pacified, and thankless,

Into the burning bowels of this earth ?

Was it cowardice, that I dared not kill him ?

Was it perversity, that I longed to talk to him ?

Was it humility, to feel so honoured ?

I felt so honoured.

And yet those voices :

If you were not afraid, you would kill him !

And truly I was afraid, I was most afraid,

But even so, honoured still more

That he should seek my hospitality

From out the dark door of the secret earth.

He drank enough

And lifted his head, dreamily, as one who has drunken,

And flickered his tongue like a forked night on the air, so black,

Seeming to lick his lips,

And looked around like a god, unseeing, into the air,

And slowly turned his head,

And slowly, very slowly, as if thrice adream,

Proceeded to draw his slow length curving round

And climb again the broken bank of my wall-face.

And as he put his head into that dreadful hole,

And as he slowly drew up, snake-easing his shoulders, and entered farther,

A sort of horror, a sort of protest against his withdrawing into that horrid black hole,

Deliberately going into the blackness, and slowly drawing himself after,

Overcame me now his back was turned.

I looked round, I put down my pitcher,

I picked up a clumsy log

And threw it at the water-trough with a clatter.

I think it did not hit him,

But suddenly that part of him that was left behind convulsed in undignified haste,

Writhed like lightning, and was gone

Into the black hole, the earth-lipped fissure in the wall-front,

At which, in the intense still noon, I stared with fascination.

And immediately I regretted it.

I thought how paltry, how vulgar, what a mean act !

I despised myself and the voices of my accursed human education.

And I thought of the albatross,

And I wished he would come back, my snake.

For he seemed to me again like a king,

Like a king in exile, uncrowned in the underworld,

Now due to be crowned again.

And so, I missed my chance with one of the lords

Of life.

And I have something to expiate :

A pettiness.

Now it can be told: the traumatic tale of switching hairdressers

2013-02-20T13:13:00.002-06:00

You are forgiven for thinking I fell off the face of the earth (although technically that metaphor makes no sense, but whatever). I did not write for most of last month and most of this month. There is a reason for that: I was wallowing in immense sadness. I suffered a great traumatic event last month, and it took me all this time to recover fully. Well, not fully. I still have nightmares, but don't tell anybody that.

But now, dear readers, it can be finally told. Just for your collective sake and just for your entertainment (for, if you read the banner of this blog closely, we do promise to sacrifice our well-being for your entertainment) I have summoned every picogram of courage I possess to write this piece up. You're welcome. We accept checks, although we really prefer cold, hard cash. Email me to find out where to send the goodies.

This is the story of a guy who, after years of hopelessly searching for the perfect haircut, finally found the right hairdresser who not only understood every whim fancy of his truculent (look it up) hair, but also creatively cajoled it every damn time.

It went something like this: here in the city of the great Saint Louis, I stumbled into a venerable hair salon, wild eyed and frazzled (literally), looking for assistance. This place is majestic: plush leather chairs, free hot towels, and free beer. Did you read that last part? Yeah this place serves free beer with your haircut. I got down on my knees and begged them to tame my unruly mane. One hairdresser brave and adventurous enough took up the challenge.

Over the next four or five visits, she told me the same stories, meaning she didn't really know who I was and thought I was a different customer each time. The next visit, though, the stories began changing. After hearing about her how her three children keep her busy at home and how my hair looked a lot like her husband's for the first four times, I began hearing about siblings in the military. I learned her daughter's soccer coach was a mean jerk. The teenage son broke the truck door and was now mowing lawns to pay for it. The younger son broke his leg but the idiot ER doctor wouldn't give him anything stronger than ibuprofen. By the seventh visit, she started saying "shit" around me. Now the talk turned to politics and war and elections and alien documentaries on history channel. She was mortified her young daughter was humming Flo Rida's "Whistle".

And then it crashed to an end. Visit #8: I called to make an appointment and requested her.
"Oh she doesn't work here anymore."
*Deadly silence on my end*

The world started spinning. I whispered some incoherent nonsense and hung up, too shaken up to say anything else. The next few weeks were rough. My slow descent into despair was halted only by a looking patient session. Can't afford to look like bazooka joe for that. Wearily and sullenly I trudged up to the salon and found the next available person.

The replacement and I have had two sessions so far. I was told about her days as an aerobic instructor and jewellery model in Vegas in the 1980's, of the wild parties the good folks of Cahokia, Illinois throw. It's a work in progress.

To this day I jerk awake in the middle of the night, sweat draining on my bedsheets.

Poem of the week - "Ring out, wild bells" by Tennyson

2013-01-02T01:55:00.003-06:00

In spirit of the Christmas/New Year season, here's a classic by Alfred "call me Lord" Tennyson. A tender piece of work that is still widely read this time of the year. Enjoy.

Ring out, wild bells

Ring out, wild bells, to the wild sky,
The flying cloud, the frosty light;
The year is dying in the night;
Ring out, wild bells, and let him die.

Ring out the old, ring in the new,
Ring, happy bells, across the snow:
The year is going, let him go;
Ring out the false, ring in the true.

Ring out the grief that saps the mind,
For those that here we see no more,
Ring out the feud of rich and poor,
Ring in redress to all mankind.

Ring out a slowly dying cause,
And ancient forms of party strife;
Ring in the nobler modes of life,
With sweeter manners, purer laws.

Ring out the want, the care the sin,
The faithless coldness of the times;
Ring out, ring out my mournful rhymes,
But ring the fuller minstrel in.

Ring out false pride in place and blood,
The civic slander and the spite;
Ring in the love of truth and right,
Ring in the common love of good.

Ring out old shapes of foul disease,
Ring out the narrowing lust of gold;
Ring out the thousand wars of old,
Ring in the thousand years of peace.

Ring in the valiant man and free,
The larger heart, the kindlier hand;
Ring out the darkness of the land,
Ring in the Christ that is to be.

End of the year stuff

2012-12-31T22:20:00.000-06:00

Dec 31. Another year comes to end. Time for every two-bit hack to publish his/her "best of " lists. his formality is weary, but whatever. No reason for me to get left out.

Every now and then someone will ask me to give a few book recommendations. I enjoy talking about books as much as I enjoy reading them, so I don't need much excuse to write this list. Here is Universal Gravitation's very own "Best books in 2012", winnowed down from a number of books read across various genres. Notice the little "in" in the title. These were books that I read in 2012, not ones that were necessarily published this year. I did a similar list last year too, so if you want more perspectives/recommendations, feel free to head over to that post .

Onward.

Non-fiction:

Genghis Khan and the making of the modern world by Jack Weatherford:

Fascinating, succinct and engrossing look at history's perhaps most successful (both in terms of lands conquered and subsequent dynasties spawned) clan. In one form or another, the Mongols and their descendants ended up ruling much of Eastern Europe, Arabia, Central Asia, China and other large swathes of South Asia.

Einstein's dreams by Alan Lightman:

Written by a Caltech professor, this book imagines the thought process of a young patent clerk Einstein - on the threshold of greatness and immortality - furiously working on his theory of special relativity in 1905. Essentially it is a collection of little essays, each one a though experiment (as conducted by Einstein) into how different the world would be if time were not linear. I had to think about putting this in non-fiction, but finally decided to do so because above all, it's a great philosophical foray into the nature of time.

Fiction:

Cryptonomicon by Neal Stephenson:

It is normally difficult to pull off a multiple-narrative meganovel, but Stephenson does it with great competence and style. Coming in at an impressive 1168 pages, this novel alternates between WWII and the present. Diverse topics like espionage, cybercrime, e-commerce, treasure hunting, WWII era codebreaking and local politics in Philippines and explored via a rambunctious and eclectic cast of characters big enough to fill a football roster (53 for those not in the know). The two timelines are connected by a missing treasure and blood (a lot of the characters in the present are descendants of characters in the WWII timeline). Very gripping and absolutely entertaining.

Atonement by Ian McEwan:

Mega-bestseller, multiple award winner blah blah. Was made into a sappy movie. The book, though, is exceptionally well-written. He has a knack for transporting readers into the worlds and the minds that inhabit the book. Demonstrates how a seemingly minor mistake by ordinary people caused by a simple misunderstanding can have far-reaching devastating effects. A pretty busy book with good plot, great language, and more importantly, one that does not shy away from discussing weighty issues like women's role in society, classism in Britain and war.

Enjoy the waning hours of 2012!

WTF pictures - Don't f@$k with Vespas

2012-12-30T23:42:00.001-06:00

Saw this hilarious sign on the sleepy streets of Pismo Beach, CA:

This was outside local Italian restaurant Giuseppe's. Quite the protector of Vespa owners' rights, this Giuseppe.

Blisters, diarrhea and giants - an accurate roundup of med school

2012-12-29T17:38:00.003-06:00

Merry (slightly belated) Christmas to you all.

(Happy Festivus if you are into that sort of thing.)

Meant to write pretty much everyday this month, but real life intervened in the form of OMG FINALS. If you spent the last three weeks frantically refreshing this page or kept re-reading past gems from this blog, I apologize profusely and sincerely. I am back now with fresh material to ensure this venerable little corner of the vast internet will not go unmanned (Or un-botted. You have no way of knowing if I am a highly proficient AI).

Recently concluded block numero tres of second year of med school. Only three more blocks to go before most of my classmates get shipped to the hospital wards and get presented with real patients with real illnesses.

This block's material explored interesting material and answered some critical questions. Like: what do you blame when your "hormones act up"? Is the pituitary gland really the "master gland"? Is there more to diarrhea than inconvenient trips to the shitcan? (Hint: yes) Can a skin rash be both macular and papular? Read on to find out.

Gastro: All about the fun stuff that goes on in the extensive set of tubing inside you. Biggest surprise for me was the time and attention they devoted to teaching the nitty-gritty details of diarrhea. The presence or absence of certain substances in the intestines (e.g. sugar-free gum, nasty bacterial toxins) can affect what "type" of diarrhea you'll suffer through. This may seem like academic voodoo magic at its finest - after all, why would you care if you had secretory or osmotic diarrhea? - and I thought so too, but knowing if your diarrhea was caused by cholera or too much sugar-free gum can make the difference between life and death because it can guide treatment.

Rest of the class was mostly about cancers. And the liver. Yeah the liver's a beast. Respect it. Fear it.

Endocrine: Deals with glands that release hormones that are responsible for an astonishing array of effects from growth to blood pressure control (for the time when you eat too many salty funyuns). These endocrine glands are scattered throughout the body, each with its set of functions. Control of these glands is nominally achieved by the pituitary gland, which is safely ensconced inside your skull. Traditionally the pituitary has been called the "master gland" (because it regulates the functions of other glands from its perch), but frankly that's a load of horseshit. In reality the pituitary is nothing a mere servant of the true mastermind (cue dramatic music), the hypothalamus - a section of your brain. It pulls all the strings and makes the magic happen.

If you made it this far, here is an image for your efforts:

This is Andre the Giant, who achieved fame as a wrestler and as an actor. His condition is caused by excess secretion of growth hormone by the pituitary gland. Fascinating, eh?

Dermatology: Skin rashes galore! In many ways the most convoluted, maddening subject this block. Kudos to the instructors, who in their crisp business-like fashion, simplified their domain for us lowly second-years. Terminology is a huge barrier.I suspect a cabal of derm's top brass got together and devised this terminology just to keep the casual learner out of their hallowed halls. A skin blemish (what you or I might call a rash or a bump) can be a macule, papule, plaque, patch (each with its own precise definition). Dermatology is probably the only area where something called lichenoid has a distinct meaning from lichenification.

Oh and in case you didn't know, the skin can get some pretty horrific maladies. Blisters,sores, rashes, flakes, infections. Most of them are caused by autoimmune processes (your body's immune system attacks its own cells for no discernible reason), which caused me to lose a lot of respect in the immune system. Images? Why here you go:

This is Bullous Pemphigoid. (Not to be confused with Pemphigus Vulgaris or Pemphigus Foliaceus) The blisters are caused because the immune system causes the top layer of the skin to "lift" from the deeper layer.

That's it for now. Come back for more!

This week in ranting: why is the pancreas so presumptuous?

2012-12-06T19:17:00.000-06:00

Welcome to the second installment of "This week in ranting". Here is first installment: The lung is a noob .

A little background before we get started: today we had a small group session devoted to breaking bad news. Usually these small groups are a colossal waste of time. People sit around holding hands singing the kumbaya and nothing of any significance gets done. This small group session was an exception. Delivering bad news to patients is a critical skill and although teaching it this early might not have terribly important retentive value, at least they are exposing us to these things. Long story short, we were supposed to deliver a diagnosis of pancreatic cancer to actors pretending to be patients.

In the midst of this session, it suddenly struck me that the pancreas is a freaking presumptuous organ. I mean look at it. What other non-paired, singular organ in the body presumes to seem and sound plural?

Ever hear the heart calling itself the "hearts"? No! Because that would be stupid. And arrogant. How would you feel if the brain woke up tomorrow asking people to call it "brains"? The brain is a pretty important organ, right? Yet you don't see it letting all this important get to it. You don't see its ego swelling to the size of a dirigible. Look at the liver - the humble little organ that could (well actually the liver is one of the largest organs in the body, but let's roll with it). It sits there patiently and meticulously filtering out all the toxins you and I brazenly dump in our bodies. But you will never hear it saying it prefers to be called the "livers."

Why the pancreas then? This gnarly (no, literally. The pancreas is pretty tortuous) piece of tissue with the texture and feel of a giant chicken tender is a fairly crucial organ. It spews out digestive enzymes and also releases important things like insulin and glucagon so your body doesn't all of a sudden go into a coma due to swings in glucose levels. But unlike the vital organs like the heart, liver or the brain, this punk slab of cells swaggers around wanting its name to seem plural. An obvious case of plurality envy, if you ask me. It is clearly jealous of the lungs, the kidneys, the testes, the ovaries, the eyes, the limbs and so on.

So I looked into this a little bit more. Turns out some ancient Greek idiot named it the pancreas (meaning "whole flesh"). The plural of pancreas is pancreases or pancreata (yuck). Here's probably what actually happened: some Greek anatomist was looking at this yet-unnamed organ and was preparing to call it something sensible and singular. But this punk probably threw a tantrum and threatened to dissolve all organs around it with its enzymes. Faced with such daring thuggery, the Greeks promptly called it the pancreas.

So here I am, seething with rage and incredulity, while the pancreas prances around holding us hostage.

WTF pictures - Eastern Poland is apparently THE place to invest and make money

2012-12-04T16:35:00.000-06:00

So here I was, flipping through this week's Economist, reading about exotica such as passing away of Britain's famous speaking clock (apparently in Britain you call a number and have a voice tell you the time of the day) and gerrymandering in Georgia (the nation, not the state) when I came across this gem:

This old man looks awfully grumpy. In all honesty, he looks like a hardass. If this is my future father-in-law...yikes.

Poem of the week - "I heard a fly buzz when I died" by Dickinson

2012-12-03T22:35:00.000-06:00

Emily Dickinson, much revered today, was considered an oddball back in her time. She wrote without much care for such niceties as punctuation, capitalization and rhyming scheme. She was a very prolific poet, but only a mere handful of her poems were published during her lifetime. After her death the poetry world was blessed with the discovery of a trove of her unpublished work, nearly couple thousand poems.

Here's one of her most famous works. I love the sombre tone and the morbid nature of it.

I heard a fly buzz when I died;

The stillness round my form
Was like the stillness in the air

Between the heaves of storm.

The eyes beside had wrung them dry,

And breaths were gathering sure
For that last onset, when the king

Be witnessed in his power.

I willed my keepsakes, signed away

What portion of me I
Could make assignable,-and then

There interposed a fly,

With blue, uncertain, stumbling buzz,

Between the light and me;
And then the windows failed, and then

I could not see to see.

Random thoughts

2012-11-23T19:08:00.000-06:00

Happy thanksgiving to you all. Quick hits to keep you going through this holiday break.

1. Survived what seemed like the flight from hell on Tuesday from St. Louis to LAX. Got stuck in the dreaded middle seat, was only two seats behind a wailing toddler and right next to a dude with a tiny dog in what looked like an oversized lunch bag. On top of that the plane just sat there, just chilling, on the runway for eternity. On the plus side I blazed through a novel during the flight. This one: Sense of an Ending .

Pretty great (and short) read. I like novels that effortlessly blend philosophy with literature and this one succeeds at that. Difficult for me to explain the "plot" because it doesn't really have one. It's just this dude Tony Webster who is looking back at his life reminiscing about the nature of memory and history and friendship and relationships. He ruminates about how one seemingly trivial decision on his part ended up changing the lives of four people irrevocably. If you are into literary awards (and scour literary blogs to check out the nominees every once in a while, like me), this one won the Booker prize.

2. Couple weeks ago I whined about how my friends forced me to buy a bicycle helmet and how it would spell the end of my days as a rebel bike rider. Well turns out I was wrong. The helmet is pretty awesome. When I walk around holding it, I feel like a goddamn football player. The closest I will ever get to that feeling, I suppose. Plus it keeps me warm when I fit it snugly over my beanie.

3. Speaking of football, thanksgiving offered some exciting football. The Jets embarrassed themselves in royal fashion in front of a massive national audience. This gif of Mark "The Sanchize" Sanchez fumbling the ball after running headfirst into his lineman's ass sums it up:

4. For the heck of it, here is one of my favorite paintings. It's called Wanderer above the sea of fog by Casper David Friedrich. Enjoy:

Poem of the week - "The secret sits" by Robert Frost

2012-11-16T12:55:00.000-06:00

Not really a complete poem, more of a couplet. A friend sent it to me last week after we discussed some poetry in the gym while benching.

Here's Robert Frost:

The secret sits

We dance round in a ring and suppose,

But the Secret sits in the middle and knows

Horsing around during a hurricane

2012-11-01T11:32:00.001-05:00

Horsing around during hurricane Sandy, quite literally, is this guy:

Like a boss.

This week in ranting: the lung is a noob

2012-10-31T20:27:00.003-05:00

Exams on Monday - heart, lungs and kidneys.

The more I learn about disease processes in the lungs, the more incredulous I get. Simply put, the lung is such a noob at fighting infections. I mean look at it. Almost every insult to the lung ultimately results in irreversible fibrosis and some weakass exudative stuff going on in the alveoli which ends up doing more harm than good anyway. All the reactive immune responses in the lung end up causing harmful granulomas. Every kind of terrible lesion seems to happen in the lungs. Pus? We got it. Abscess? Ooh we have multiple kinds of abscesses. Which one would you like? Necrosis? Again, such a wide variety to choose from! Unresolved, persistent infections? Check.

You would think the body would do a better job at protecting such a vital organ that literally keeps you alive by dumping out CO2 for O2 and by sweeping out all manner of gunk that gets in.

That's my rant for the week.

Random stuff

2012-10-28T11:10:00.002-05:00

Random stuff that I want to talk about.

I have made no secret of my intense passion for bikes and biking. I have blathered about the topic several times, like here and here . This week my days as a glorious and proud outlaw came to an end. I surrendered my gritty, badass ways and agreed to abide by society's repressive laws. That's right. I finally purchased a helmet. For 10+ years I rode around unfettered, like an untamed majestic beast of the wild. Now after months of persistent pushing, both by friends and family, I am a rebel no more. Here is the heinous object that made it happen:

Notwithstanding this (admittedly) funny commercial, I walked out of the Apple store here with an iPhone 5:

Speaking of lemmings, this comic from one of my favorite strips 'Pearls before swines' is absolutely hilarious:

Idiopathic Pulmonary Fibrosis is a terrible, terrible disease. 50% mortality in about 2 years. Wouldn't wish it on your worst enemy (or maybe you would).

That's it from your favorite blogger here.

Starry starry night: musings on the tragedy of van Gogh

2012-10-24T11:13:00.001-05:00

My good friend (let's call him PH) here introduced me to this gem of a song by Don McLean (he of "American Pie") last week. Most of you might be familiar with it; I wasn't. Now I am a hooked.

It's called "Vincent" and it's McLean's beautiful homage to the life of artist Vincent van Gogh.

McLean's voice is so clear and gentle in this song. And the lyrics. Oh man, the lyrics.

Starry, starry night
Portraits hung in empty halls
Frameless heads on nameless walls

Such amazing poetry.

This song set off a period of van Gogh obsession for me. After making an obligatory pilgrimage to his wikipedia page, I was astounded to learn how difficult and tragic his life actually was. Prior to this I always assumed he became famous during his lifetime and suffered from mental problems toward the end of his life due to mercury or lead poisoning.

Turns out he spent most of life as a failure, forever frustrated, both at himself for failing to achieve goals he set for himself and at the world for not reciprocating his earnest attempts to define it. Vincent was a veritable Europe-trotter, moving and staying in various towns and cities across multiple countries. He wanted to become a priest and enrolled multiple times in schools, but always found himself getting thrown out (once for being too spartan and austere - he slept in a stable because he believed he should suffer to enhance his piety). Periods of apprenticeship in art shops and schools also ended in failures.

Vincent wrote a lot of letters to his brother, an art dealer, and much knowledge about his life comes from those letters. He struggled with loneliness and terrible mood swings. He contracted syphilis (much like Nietzsche), which almost certainly contributed to the neurological symptoms later in his life.

But through it all, he kept drawing and sketching, down to the last days of his life. At age 37, after multiple visits in and out of sanitariums and asylums, he shot himself. Reportedly his last words to his brother were, "The sadness will last forever."

van Gogh's paintings are, of course, uber famous today. Starry Night, Sunflowers, View of Arles. But I wanna show this one portrait he drew, mere two months before his death.


At Eternity's Gate

I like to think that's Vincent imagining himself as an old man, deep in his sorrow.

What's in a name: anatomy of a username

2012-10-22T17:20:00.001-05:00

I often get asked where/how I chose my username. I use it across different platforms with some variation. Since I have nothing better to write about at the moment I decided to make a whole post about the genesis of my online handle.

Gather around kids! Grandpa has a story for you!

It's 1861 in Imperial Russia. The river Don is aflush with premium vodka. Tsar (czar/csar/tzar/tswhatever) Alexander II, perhaps taking a break from the vodka-drinking championship circuit, decides to set the serfs free. Freedom and equality for all! Bastille! Oh wait, that's French.

You can imagine the complications this causes. The old nobility, accustomed to sitting on its ass chugging vodka, is not happy. The old fogs are already annoyed with the kids these days. Those darn kids are learning European liberalism in their universities and schools. And now they have to deal with Alex's laws.

In this setting Russian novelist Ivan Turgenev pens what will become an enduring masterpiece. It has a boring name - 'Fathers and Sons'. It is received shittily by the critics. Embarrassed, Ivan drinks some vodka and leaves Russia.

But it's a damn fine story. It made a big impression on my naive and pliable mind when I read it in 2008. So you have two bosom buddies: Arkady (it's ok to forget his name - he is not that important) and Bazarov. They are visiting Arkady's estate after graduating from college (road trip bro!). Bazarov is now a medical student. He is also a virulent nihilist, meaning he doesn't believe in literally anything (well it's more complicated than that, but we'll leave it at that). Firm and set in his radical ideas, he doesn't have patience for old-school bullshit. Doesn't even need vodka to get into fights with people. Like Arkady's uncle, your prototypical sit-on-the-ass-chugging-vodka nobleman. Good guy Arkady takes Bazarov to the house of Anna Odnitsova, a wealthy family friend. Bazarov starts arguing with her. About love, God, politics, schooling, weather, flowers. Says he doesn't believe in falling in love. Thinks it's all an oppressive social construct maliciously created by the rich.

Tragedy ensues when he does, in fact, fall in love with Anna. Worse, he gets rejected. Disgusted with himself for letting himself fall in love, he goes back home. There he spends months in distress and confusion. Fights with Arkady, his only friend. Gets clumsy with an autopsy and contracts typhus. Soon Bazarov is dead. Clearly Ivan has a flair for the dramatic.

When I read the book, I was clearly drawn to Bazarov's self-assured nature and his insistence on getting rid of extraneous stuff (like meaningless social conventions, old ideas etc.) from life. And there is something to be said about the irony of him dying of love, the very thing he fought with every fiber of his (supposedly) rational, nihilist brain.

I am a big fan of Russian literature and Bazarov was a sufficiently unique name. So I stuck with username. Plus it gives me the opportunity to bore people with a long-winded story each time a question about its origin is raised.

BTW, there is lot more to the novel (some interesting side stories involving Arkady's daddy and uncle, Arkady himself, Bazarov's dad etc.) and I highly recommend it if you are interested in Russian literature or just literature in general.

Poem of the week - "Squattings" by Rimbaud

2012-10-17T12:59:00.000-05:00

Continuing our theme of volatile, passionate and brilliant poets, today's installment is courtesy of the French poet Arthur Rimbaud. I managed to snag an excellent used copy of his poems for just three dollars at the local bookstore recently. Rimbaud personifies young rebelliousness. Most teenagers/young adults will pout at needless social conventions or the forceful but irrational rule of authority and will stop once they hit adulthood. Rimbaud took to poetry. By age 20, he was dazzling those around him with his irreverence, boldness and arrogance. He died of cancer at just 37.

Following is one of his "milder" poems. I love his long, deliberative approach to the central act.

Here's "Squattings":

Very late, when he feels his stomach churn,
Brother Milotus, one eye on the skylight whence the sun,
bright as a scoured stewpan, darts a megrim at him
and dizzies his sight, moves his priest's belly under the sheets.

He struggles beneath the grey blanket and gets out,
his knees to his trebling belly, flustered like an old man
who has swallowed a pinch of snuff,
because he has to tuck up his nightshirt in armfuls
round his waist with one hand
grasping the handle of a white chamberpot!

Now he is squatting, chilly, his toes curled up,
his teeth chattering in the bright sunshine
which dubs the yellow of cake upon the paper panes;
and the old fellow's nose, its crimson catching fire,
snuffles in the rays like a polypary of flesh.

The old fellow simmers at the fire, his arms twisted,
his blubber lips on his belly:
he feels his thighs slipping into the fire,
and his breeches scorching, and his pipe going out;
something resembling a bird stirs a little in his serene belly
which is like a mountain of tripe!
Round about him sleeps a jumble of stunned furniture
among tatters of filth, lying on soiled bellies;
stools cower like weird toads in dark corners:
cupboards have maws like choirmasters,
yawning with a sleepiness which is full of revolting appetites.
The sickening heat stuffs the narrow room;
the old fellow's head is crammed with rags:
he listens to the hairs growing in his moist away,
shaking his rickety stool..
And in the evening, in rays of moonlight
which leaves dribbles of light
on the contours of his buttocks,
a shadow with details squats
against a background of snow-coloured pink like a hollyhock …
Fantastic, a nose follows Venus in the deep sky.

UG Sports: Then there were three

2012-10-04T16:16:00.000-05:00

The first four weeks of this NFL season were so crazy that the only way I can do justice to the craziness is to upend the modifier 'batshit' to crazy. Everyone and everyone's grandmother has written/ranted/spewed froth about 'Golden-gate', aka 'the one that was stolen from Green Bay', so I won't talk about the replacement refs at all. They are gone now. Let us all have the same poise as Packers coach Mike McCarthy, who phoned the guy who botched the call and left him a nice voicemail, telling him that although he didn't agree with the call (obviously), he thought the ref handled the issue with class. I will leave you with this parting gift, however. Too priceless to pass up:

Besides, there is plenty of other craziness to talk about.

Like how the Payton-deprived Saints are 0-4, landing them in the same dubious pithole as the hapless Cleveland Browns, who seem to have perfected the technique of squandering good draft picks year after year.

Or how the Arizona Cardinals are 4-0, having beaten New England and Philadelphia in back-to-back games. Couple seasons ago the NFC West was the league's doormat - every team, fan, analyst loved wiping their shoes on it. The 49ers changed all of that last year. That seems to have stirred up their division mates. Lost among all the noise about the controversial Green Bay-Seattle game was the fact that Seattle sacked god-like Aaron Rodgers 8 times in the first half. Heck, even the Rams have shown some spunk, fake punting and muscling their way into improbable victories.

Two other teams sit at 4-0: Houston and Atlanta. Admittedly, the Cards won't be able to hold on to their record for long. But Houston, with its easy-as-cake division (Peyton-deprived Indianapolis, Tennessee, and perennial joke Jacksonville) and a comparatively easy schedule, has a legitimate chance of matching the 2007 Patriots or the 1972 Miami Dolphins.

Matt Ryan is finally living up to his potential. The way he bailed out the Falcons against Cam "superman" Newton was impressive.

Some other thoughts:

After that 34-0 shellacking at home, how long till the Jets ditch the Sanchize and put Tebow at the center? They play the Texans next Monday so I would bet money on Monday being Tebowtime.
Brady vs. Manning resumes this Sunday as the Broncos travel to Foxboro. Perhaps the last time we will see these two at it.
And thanks Chicago defense for depriving me of what seemed like a surefire fantasy win on Monday night.

Poem of the week - "A Cloud in Trousers" by Mayakovsky

2012-09-28T16:58:00.002-05:00

Vladimir Mayakovsky was a firebrand Russian poet who flourished in the early decades of the 20th century. A passionate and no-nonsense poet (he despised the idea of using flowery language), he was widely popular outside of the newly formed USSR, and toured extensively in the US, France, Germany and Britain.

Like many brilliant but volatile literary figures Mayakovsky suffered bouts of depression and agitation. He shot himself at 37.

"Cloud in Trousers" is a long poem that earned him widespread recognition. Here's the prologue from that poem. Mayakovsky's assertiveness and brash confidence can be seen clearly in many verses:

Your thought,
musing on a sodden brain
like a bloated lackey on a greasy couch.
I'll taunt with a bloody morsel of heart;
and satiate my insolent, caustic contempt.

No grey hairs streak my soul,
no grandfatherly fondness there!
I shake the world with the might of my voice,
and walk – handsome,
twentytwoyearold.

Tender souls!
You play your love on a fiddle,
and the crude club their love on a drum.
But you cannot turn yourself inside out,
like me, and be just bare lips!

Come and be lessoned –
prim officiates of the angelic league,
lisping in drawing-room cambric.

You, too, who leaf your lips like a cook
turns the pages of a cookery book.

If you wish,
I shall rage on raw meat;
or, as the sky changes its hue,
if you wish,
I shall grow irreproachably tender:
not a man, but a cloud in trousers!

I deny the existence of blossoming Nice!
Again in song I glorify
men as crumpled as hospital beds,
and women as battered as proverbs.

Badass Mathematicians - 2: Emmy Noether

2012-09-25T21:44:00.000-05:00

(Part 2 of an occasional series where I profile some influential mathematicians. Part 1, covering the volatile Frenchman Evariste Galois, is here )

Emmy Noether was that special type of badass whose contributions to pure mathematics ended up becoming the impetus for much of modern physics. Before we get to that bit of badassery, some details about her life. She was born in Germany in 1882. Father Max was a mathematician also. Wikipedia tells me he names a couple theorems in his own right. Couple of her brothers got doctorates and such. In short, she was part of an academically inclined family.

What a badass bowtie

After going through routine schooling, where she was a pretty good student, she reach a dead end. Society expected her to become a teacher for girls' school. Noether had other ideas. The powers that be at her university saw great ills in allowing mixed education. They let her enroll grudgingly. Within a few years, she hammered out a fine PhD thesis titled "On Complete Systems of Invariants for Ternary Biquadratic Forms". Later she called it crap. Sounds perfectly fine to me, but hey what do I know.

Contemporary mathematical beast David Hilbert invited her to join him at Gottigen university. There, despite toiling hard as a superb professor without pay for the first two years, she produced some solid papers on topics well above my pay grade.

It was there she formulated the theorem that would propel her into the pantheon of badasses. Here's the statement:

"To every differentiable symmetry generated by local actions, there corresponds a conserved current."

Huh? What? Here is what it means in plain (relatively speaking) English: if a physical law does not change under conditions of space and time, it must have a quantity that is conserved.

This theorem basically explains why conservation of momentum and energy are true. This became key in formulating advanced models for quantum mechanics and particle physics. Since any model describing a physical law (something like the nuclear force, for example) has to have a conserved quantity, one's job of finding possible models just became (relatively) easier.

The explosion of theories to describe exotic particle interactions through the 1960's and 1970's owes a lot to Noether. You might remember all the hoopla about the Higgs Boson couple months ago. Noether's theorem operating behind the scenes there too.

When Hitler came to power in Germany, Noether came to the States. Here she spent two happy years teaching at Bryn Mawr college before she passed away of complications due to an ovarian cyst.

As if concocting one seminal theorem wasn't enough, Noether proved several key results in stuff like abstract algebra, ring theory, noncommutative algebras (look these things up on wiki if you're interested. The last one is pretty cool).

Next time someone asks you at a cocktail party why energy is conserved just snap back, "Because Emmy says so!"